PM gets backing of county MPs

Government whips have also reportedly told MPs they face being deselected ahead of the next General Election if they vote with opposition MPs to prevent a no-deal Brexit.

Philip Dunne, MP for Ludlow, said he fully understood why Prime Minister Boris Johnson was insisting on party loyalty.

"I'm not surprised the new Prime Minister, in his first full week in Parliament since becoming Prime Minister and facing a challenge to his position on the EU, has chosen to effectively make it a confidence issue.

"He needs to stop being frustrated while he sorts out the Brexit situation."

Shrewsbury and Atcham MP Daniel Kawczynski called for an early general election to break the deadlock, saying it was unacceptable that a small number of Tory rebels were preventing the Government from delivering on its promises.

He said: “We need to ask the British people for a mandate for a workable majority so we can carry on.”

Mr Kawczynski said he fully supported moves to deselect MPs who were preventing the Government from delivering its promise to honour the referendum result.

Mr Dunne, though said he thought the Prime Minister would do best to hold off calling for a general election until Brexit had been delivered, although he acknowledged that he might have no choice if he lost his majority.

North Shropshire MP Owen Paterson said the Prime Minister was right to insist that party discipline was maintained.

He said it was not simply about MPs voting against a specific policy, but against the Government's power to execute its duties.

Mr Paterson said David Cameron had promised that the 2016 referendum would be decisive, a position endorsed when Philip Hammond moved the Referendum Bill in the Commons, and voted for by Conservative, Labour and Liberal Democrat MPs.

He said this week would be crucial in determining Britain's future relationship with the EU, but said he had no idea about what would happen.

He called for calm, saying some of the hyperbole surrounding the prorogation of Parliament was way over the top.

"We signed up to a customs union which accounted for eight per cent of our GDP, people got fed up when it became more than a customs union, and we voted to leave," he said.

Glynne Davies, MP for Montgomeryshire, said could understand why the Prime Minister would treat the matter as a vote of confidence in his government.

He said he was disappointed that Conservative MPs were undermining the Prime Minister as he sought to negotiate a deal.

"I'm desperate we should have a deal, and the only way we can have a deal is to prepare enthusiastically for no deal," he said.

"I don't think the European Union will take us in the slightest bit seriously if we don't prepare for no deal. I think that is the approach the Prime Minister is taking."